Handheld mobile communication devices are becoming more versatile. In addition to an operating system (OS) and a basic set of software applications, many handheld devices are now capable of running a large number of third party software applications including business productivity software, custom software applications for specific industries, gaming software, and the like. As the number of available software applications increases, the process for setting up the software applications may also become more complex.
Ideally, a process for setting up a new software application on a handheld device may be fully automated. However, in practice, there may be a need to prompt the user to grant certain permissions (e.g. to change a setting or to provide access to user data). This may especially be required where the software application setup may require changes to device settings that may affect operation of other software applications already installed and running on the device, or that may incur a charge by activating a device feature. In enterprise environments, in which a large number of the handheld devices may be centrally maintained by an administrator, there may also be enterprise security policies requiring administrative control over certain device settings.
For users, numerous prompts to provide inputs or permissions when setting up a new application may be confusing. If the user cannot understand why a permission is required, the user may be inclined to deny some or all of the requested permissions. These denials of permission may have an unintended effect of causing the setup and operation of the software application to fail, or otherwise may limit the functionality of the software application on the handheld device. Alternatively, the user may grant a blanket permission to all requests without thinking, and may inadvertently activate features, or change settings that the user did not intend to change.
Thus, what is needed is a system and method for setting application permissions that may address one or more of the limitations as described above.